Saturday, December 13, 2008
Winter is coming
Sunday, October 12, 2008
Discovery
These guys are going to be on discovery's Storm Chaser series.
I've got respect for these guys, but they also scare the hell out of me.
Kind of a "Jackass" Storm Chaser special.
I've touted http://www.tornadovideos.net/ for a couple of years and I'm glad to see them get exposure.
Reed if by any strange twist of fate you read this, you got a fan in Wichita.
Monday, September 15, 2008
Active Year
Saturday, September 13, 2008
Water, Water, Everywhere . . .
Tuesday, August 26, 2008
Love the Line
"I'm happier than a tornader in a trailer park."
Tuesday, August 19, 2008
Sunday, July 27, 2008
July Shelf Cloud
Not too much going on in Wichita as the summer weather pattern sets in and the weather becomes tedious and boring.
There isn't much to chase when you have temps over 100 and high humidity except air conditioning.
This week brought a couple interesting days. Tuesday we had 75mph wind and enough hail to make it look like it snowed hit about 4 miles away from the house. I-135 had four rigs blown off the road, and at one point the sheriff almost brought in snow removal to get rid of the hail.
Friday had some torrential downpours and enough high wind to make the rain go sideways for a little bit.
A couple of hours after the storm a nice shelf cloud came over the city. I ran to "the highest point in Sedgwick CO." and shot this.
The upper level of the shelf cloud lowered and looked like a slow avalanche. Unfortunately, the downpour hit and obscured the shelf cloud.
Saturday, June 14, 2008
Chase Log 06/12/08
We gave up on the storms and headed back into Wichita through the rain. I made it home in time to watch KAKE warn about the tornado forming near Derby. We went back out and ran South. The sky was very black as the sun set with almost an apocalyptical beauty.
The further we made it into the storm the scarier the sun looked.
We made it into Derby about the time it got dark. I had a pretty good feeling about where we were at due to the amount of KFDI, KAKE, KWCH chasers we found.
The storm kicked up speed and headed out east at a good clip. Being in the dark, with the streets flooding all around us and electricity being questionable over town we decided to call it a night.
Friday, June 13, 2008
Salina storm that turned tornadic and killed 2 people
Tuesday, June 10, 2008
Something to think about
Thursday, June 5, 2008
All for not
Well the rather rotund female has sighed the last notes of "Parsifal".
The storm of the decade turned into a moderate squall line and unleashed a herd of elephants.
On this bright side, with all the doom and gloom, no one was injured.
Taken in Newton looking out toward the Southwest around 5ish.
I think NOAA issued the warning for Wichita due to some slight rotations in the storm and a flurry of calls saying funnels were falling. I think It was SCUDS.
Taken as the storm entered Wichita's east side. There were a few moments I wondered if I was staring at a wall cloud, then it fell apart.
No harm nor foul, I've snagged my tornado for this year.
Storm Damage?
The circus is in town in Wakeenee, Kansas.
The tornado sirens and thunder spooked the elephants and they stampeded out of the fairgrounds.
There are stampeding elephants loose in Wakeenee.
"Heeh-Heeh" Like Beevis
Wednesday, June 4, 2008
Harbinger of Doom?
BY STAN FINGER
The Wichita Eagle
Computer forecasting models for the day bear striking similarities to the conditions present on June 8, 1974, when 39 tornadoes touched down in the southern Plains and killed 22 people -- including six in Emporia.
"I think this event warrants more advance warning," said Robb Lawson, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Wichita.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Storm Prediction Center has been warning for days of an outbreak on Thursday.
Forecasters disagree on where the highest risk for tornadoes will be. Many say Iowa and Minnesota, said Mike Smith, chief executive officer of WeatherData Inc., a subsidiary of AccuWeather.
But Smith has his eyes on a corridor stretching from northern Oklahoma to central Iowa -- Enid to Des Moines. That includes Wichita and the surrounding area.
"Certainly Wichita, Topeka, Emporia, Salina, Chanute... essentially the eastern half of Kansas should really be paying attention on Thursday," Smith said.
Temperature and humidity patterns for Thursday are similar to the 1974 outbreak, he said, and a wave of energy in the upper atmosphere is projected to be in exactly the same position as on June 8, 1974.
The 1974 Emporia tornado touched down at about 6 p.m., grew to about a half-mile wide, and struck the city's northwest side, according to weather service archives.
It injured 200 people and caused an estimated $25 million in damage in Lyon County alone, striking a shopping center, mobile home park, nursing home, an apartment complex and residential neighborhoods in Emporia and about 10 farmsteads in the surrounding countryside.
The tornado was rated an F-4 and had a 38-mile track through Lyon, Osage and Shawnee counties.
With so much humidity in place, storms this Thursday could form and quickly become strong, forecasters say.
And with wind speeds in the upper atmosphere resembling early spring patterns, any tornadoes that touch down could move at more than 50 mph.
"If you take April dynamics and June thermodynamics," Smith said, "you have a potentially disastrous combination."
Photo: heavy rain from a 05/27/08 storm shot from Kechi, KS.
Friday, May 30, 2008
Something of Interest
2008 so far..
Super Tuesday Outbreak - 57 fatalities, 84 tornadoes
May 10-11 Tornado Outbreak - 24 fatalities, about 60 tornadoes
2008 Plains Tornado Sequence - 11 fatalities, 38+ tornadoes
May 1-2 Tornado Outbreak - 6 fatalities, 50 tornadoes
January Tornado Outbreak Sequence - 4 fatalities, 72 tornadoes
Atlanta Tornado Outbreak - 3 fatalities, 29 tornadoes
And they just put up a tornado watch for eastern Kansas.
Monday, May 26, 2008
Chase Log 052408
We had a nice stovepipe funnel reach out of the rainshaft and dance around for a while before it dissipated. The chasers closer to the storm said there was a fairly large tornado inside that was rainwrapped. The rain stopped and the wall clouds seemed to die out.
The entire area was cloaked in rain and the Perry Police started getting nervous. They told us we needed to go to shelter or go north on I-35. We went about a mile to the next stop. Another convince store with an overhang and a Subway. My brother had the munchies so he went in, paced around, and said their were about 50 people all trying to get into the women's bathroom for shelter.
We hung out as hail hit the area and then went a little further north to get out of the rain. Before long, the national weather service reported that the storm was dying and had lost rotation. In other words, heavy, heavy, heavy rain.
Jeff and I headed back to Wichita pausing for gasoline.
The final shots are out of Tonkawa, OK. There's a Dairy Queen and a truckstop here, and it seems that this place has a special ability to pull storms to or near it. I've seen about three tornadic situations here.
It scares me to think about what has happened over the last five days. There has been a large loss of life, property, and 172 reports of tornados. This isn't normal.
Be aware and keep your eyes to the sky. Today's probability is overhead in Wichita.
Sunday, May 25, 2008
Saturday, May 24, 2008
Greensburg part deux
Wednesday, May 21, 2008
Sunday, May 18, 2008
I got nothing
My small car cost me $42 this week.
Tuesday, May 6, 2008
Greensburg Chasers
I think these are the guys with the only documented picture of the tornado.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MBSps3VviB8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r1f9w7DXlgU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=couSqNjIjGU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T4zuh9DgouA
Sunday, May 4, 2008
I did a huge post on GreensBurg and the computer ate it.
So the long and short of it . . .
At 9:45 p.m. CDT on May 4, 2007[11], Greensburg was hit by an EF5 tornado. The tornado was estimated to be 1.7 miles (2.7 km) in width and traveled for nearly 22 miles (35 km). Ninety-five percent of the city was confirmed to be destroyed, with the other five percent being severely damaged. The National Weather Service estimated winds of the tornado to reach 205 mph (330 km/h).
Stole it from Wikipedia.
I came home and at 9:30 turned on the TV.
On doppler radar, a glob came out of the storm and ate Greensburg.
I was told by one of the locals that a 92 year old man hid out from the storm in his basement. The storm roared overhead and lifted his house, threw his truck into the basement, and it killed him.
Friday, May 2, 2008
Off Topic
BY STAN FINGER
The Wichita Eagle
A 55-year-old Pretty Prairie man died at a Wichita hospital this morning after hitting a deer with his motorcycle in Reno County on Thursday night.
Robert Crandall was riding his Harley Davidson west on Pretty Prairie Road in southern Reno County just after 9:20 p.m. when a deer came out of the south ditch, Reno County Sheriff's Capt. Wayne Baughman said. The motorcycle hit the deer and carried it for about 165 feet before stopping on the shoulder of the road.
A passing motorist noticed the accident and called 911. Thursday's severe weather prevented a rescue helicopter from flying to the scene, so a Pretty Prairie ambulance brought Crandall to Via Christi Regional Medical Center-St. Francis Campus.
The case remains under investigation, Baughman said, but there are no indications that alcohol or drugs were involved. Crandall was not wearing a helmet, he said.
Thursday, May 1, 2008
050108 storms
Uncertainty
That word kills me. In the last few outbreaks anywhere near here, that word has popped up.
Today is no exception. Hell, we're smack dab in the middle of the tornado anniversaries. Hillsboro, Greensburg, Udall.
It’s been kind of a dry chase season in Wichita. Heard about another chaser going down to Oklahoma and going on a night chase. He told me that he couldn’t see it, but heard it, and then the transformers started blowing around him.
So far, we have moisture from the south and a cold front/dryline forming to the West. They are guessing some super cells forming then turning into a squall line and heading into Missouri.
I like the foreboding words at the end of the analysis . . . AND PERHAPS A COUPLE TORNADOES.
Guys, I’m like a kid at Christmas.
B